The NBA regular season ends on Wednesday. Let’s take one last look at who the front-runners are for the major six awards in this week’s NBA Award Watch.
By this time next week, the 2016-17 NBA regular season will be history. 16 of the 30 NBA teams will begin their quest for the Larry O’Brien Trophy, while the other 14 look ahead to the loaded 2017 NBA Draft coming up this summer.
Awards season is in full swing in the NBA. Some of the biggest regular season awards are still up for grabs. Here are the front-runners for the major six awards in the NBA heading into the final week in this installment of NBA Award Watch.
Most Valuable Player: Russell Westbrook
The race for 2016-17 NBA MVP has been arguably the most exciting of them all this year. It’s been a four-man race for a while, but heading into the final week, it feels like MVP will go to either Houston Rockets shooting guard James Harden or Oklahoma City Thunder point guard Russell Westbrook.
Cleveland Cavaliers small forward LeBron James and San Antonio Spurs small forward Kawhi Leonard will likely finish either third or fourth in the race. James had statistically one of his better seasons in the NBA, but his Cavaliers haven’t exactly dominated the Eastern Conference. Sitting out nationally televised games wasn’t a good look either. Leonard is too soft-spoken to realistically challenge Harden and Westbrook down the stretch.
What we’ve got here is two former Thunder buddies that love to turn the basketball over as elite, ball-dominant players. Harden and Westbrook are the lone star in the media market. This race honestly comes down to one thing: will Westbrook average a triple-double?
Should he do that, it’s his award, as the national media won’t underplay that narrative by voting Harden. Keep in mind that Oscar Robertson didn’t win the MVP when he averaged a triple-double. Westbrook’s Thunder won’t win 50 games this year, but his single-season effort is unprecedented.